Charles Lloyd: "Arrows into Infinity"

Spent Friday and today (Sunday) at the Monterey Jazz Festival—dialed in on Charles Lloyd and his trio Sangam (Friday) and his New Quartet (Sunday). Both performances different—and dazzling.

Also saw the relatively new film on Lloyd—"Arrows into Infinity." Apart from all the vintage footage—and a helpful reflection on Lloyd's time in Big Sur—drummer Eric Harland has an endearing segment on what the hell it's like to try to play between fabled tablas player Zafir Hussain and Lloyd.

And about halfway down a page of videos on Lloyd's webpage is the Montreux 1982 performance of "Forest Flower Sunset" with Michel Petrucciani. Lloyd had gone into seclusion for a decade in Big Sur — and the young Petrucciani traveled from the south of France to show up on Lloyd's doorstep.

And here's a performance of "Soaring" by the New Quartet.

Anyone have this LP?

Brett Weston — the Garrapata years

Several of the Brett Weston photographs in this YouTube slideshow can be directly identified as having come from Garrapata itself. All of the photographs, however, were taken during the 11 years when Brett was living at Garrapata (or maybe a couple were taken shortly thereafter) — an 11-year period that began in November 1948 when Brett and his brother Cole bought 80 acres along Garrapata Creek.

Of course, the images that will appear on your screen pale compared with the photographs themselves.

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Notes

The best account of this photographic period in Brett's life that I have found comes from Dody Thompson, who was married to Brett during most of these years. One place her essay appears is as the introduction to Brett Weston: Master Photographer, published by Photography West Graphics in 1989.

The music that accompanies the slide-show is Charles Lloyd's "Sister" from his album Notes from Big Sur.

The images of Brett's photographs come from The Brett Weston Archive.